39 
variety. The hunter’s skin mentioned above as having been examined 
on March 18, 1925, when compared wdth the collection of seventeen skins, 
was unhesitatingly referred to the dark variety, although it was decidedly 
lighter-coloured than the average. The skins of the dark variety are, in 
general, whitish cream below, merging into buff on upper parts of sides, 
buff on the back with a median band of black guard hairs, 4 to 6 inches 
wide and extending the length of the animal. The pale-coloured varieties 
lack even a suggestion of a dark band along the back. Hantzsch (1913, 
p. 151) on June 10, 1910, while on the way to Nettilling lake, saw a yellow- 
ish white wolf with abundant, brownish black hairs on the back. 
7. Lynx canadensis canadensis Kerr. Canada lynx. 
John Hayward, of the Hudson’s Bay Company’s post, Pangnirtung, 
informed the writer that a lynx was shot by an Eskimo, during the winter 
of 1918, at Lake harbour. It w r as supposed that the animal was carried 
on moving ice, across Hudson strait from the Ungava side. About the 
same time a lynx was caught on Coats island, by Stephen J. Stewart, and 
another was shot by an Eskimo on ice-floes off Wakeham bay on the south 
side of Hudson strait. These records seem to indicate that, for at least 
a time, a northward movement prevailed among the lynx. 
8. Phoca vitulina concolor (DeKay). harbottr seal. 
Eskimo: Kassigiak. 
The harbour seal is one of the rarer of the pinnipedia inhabiting the 
seas about Baffin island. Nearly a year passed before the writer even saw 
a skin in the possession of the Eskimo. An Eskimo of Pangnirtung fiord 
said that in his lifetime he had shot only six harbour seals, whereas he 
had killed hundreds of the common species, Phoca hispida. 
On March 13, 1926, a specimen was secured at Sardukdjuak, Nettilling 
fiord. Its length was, approximately, 5 feet 3 inches, and its weight was 
estimated to be between 300 and 400 pounds. It contained a foetus in 
an advanced state, which probably would have been born early in April. 
None of the four Eskimo of the writer’s party had ever seen the young 
of the species, although hundreds of those of the ringed seal are handled 
every year by Cumberland Sound Eskimo. The foetus was smoky-grey 
and the hair was smooth. 
The Eskimo state that harbour seals have been seen in the summer 
on Kassigejut lake, situated near Nauyarping. The lake, at spring tides, 
is entered by salt water, in small quantities, from Nettilling fiord. 
Kumlien (1879, pp. 55), referring to this species, writes: “The so-called 
fresh water seal of the whalemen is one of the rarer species in the Cum- 
berland waters. They are mostly met with far up the fiords and in the 
fresh water streams and ponds, where they go after salmon.” Hantzsch 
(1913, p. 156) knew of only three or four of these seals having been taken 
during the winter of 1909-10, by the Eskimo of Blacklead island. Eskimo 
state that this seal is occasionally taken at Ponds inlet. Seals are mentioned 
in most writings dealing with the Arctic and although the exact species in 
many cases is not indicated, it is altogether probable that the harbour 
seal occurs, at least sparingly, the whole length of Baffin island. 
The skin of the harbour seal, because of its appearance, is prized by 
Eskimo women more highly than that of any other species. Kumlien 
(1879, p. 55) remarks: “It is said, possibly with a shade of exaggeration, 
that the affections of the Eskimo damsel can be secured by a present of 
